Contact:  Melissa Potter
September 29, 2006

Guest Speaker Lozoff at MECC on October 16

Bo Lozoff, founder of the Human Kindness Foundation and its internationally acclaimed Prison-Ashram Project, will be a guest speaker at Mountain Empire Community College on Monday, October 16. Lozoff, whose fans range from Mister Rogers to the Dalai Lama, will speak at 12 p.m. and later in the day at 7 p.m. Both presentations will take place in Dalton-Cantrell Hall’s Fugate Auditorium.

Lozoff, who has visited over 800 prisons worldwide, helped to begin the Prison-Ashram Project in 1973. The project encourages prisoners to use prisons as ashrams, a place where people live for some period of time in order to strengthen their spiritual practice and self-discipline. A great number of prisoners showed interest and by 1975, the project became Lozoff’s full-time job as he began traveling to prisons and speaking with inmates.

He and his wife, Sita, have been the directors of the Prison-Ashram Project since its inception. In 1987, they also created the Human Kindness Foundation, a non-profit organization which stresses a way of life based on simple living, a dedication to service, and a commitment to personal spiritual practice. Lozoff continues to travel around the country, speaking at prison workshops, public talks and discussions, and concerts.

“Bo is a very interesting person,” says MECC Professor Robert England, who took students from his Criminal Justice classes to East Tennessee State University last February to hear Lozoff speak. At that presentation, he spoke about his work with prison inmates and the restorative justice model in which individuals are restored to become a meaningful part of society after being released from prison. England was so impressed that he decided to ask Lozoff to speak at MECC.

Both of the speaking engagements in Fugate Auditorium will be open to the public and free of charge. For more information about Lozoff or the Human Kindness Foundation, visit the website at www.humankindness.org.

Bo Lozoff, pictured here with his wife Sita, will speak at Mountain Empire Community College on Monday, October 16 at 12 p.m. and 7 p.m. He is the founder of the Human Kindness Foundation and its internationally acclaimed Prison-Ashram Project.

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